Reading time: 5 – 8 minutes
I’m devoting this week’s articles to author Gary B. Cohen’s recent book, Just Ask Leadership: Why Great Managers Always Ask the Right Questions. I reviewed the book in my the last article. Today’s article is part one of a two-part interview with Gary.
As a leader, I spent the majority of my time asking questions. I saw firsthand how open-ended questions inspired and engaged my coworkers. Rick Diamond and I grew our business from 2 employees to 2,200, using the Just Ask approach. But when I attended leadership training programs at Harvard Business School, Covey Leadership Institute, Disney Institute, and The Aspen Institute, the subject of question-asking didn’t come up. And when my instructors asked questions, they typically knew the answer in advance.
Why was question-asking so central to my organization’s success and so absent in leadership training programs? I went on a quest to find out. I interviewed over 100 high-achieving leaders about their use of questions—what worked for them, when, how, and why. Some employed Just Ask Leadership skills consciously, but many did it unconsciously. On average, however, these leaders used questions 70-80 percent of the time, rather than commands. The fact that these exceptional leaders spent this much of their time asking questions convinced me that I was onto something big.
Just Ask Leadership is incredibly easy to implement. All leaders ask questions; most leaders just need to ask more and better questions. The results – a dramatic lift in alignment, engagement, and accountability from coworkers – will happen almost immediately, which helps sustain the Just Ask “habit.”
It helps, of course, if leaders know their questioning style so that they can let the situation and their coworkers’ needs dictate the questions they ask, rather than rely solely on instinct. Leaders can learn more about their questioning style and how to expand their repertoire by taking a Just Ask Leadership Assessment. I spent two years creating this tool with 4ROI’s Keith Morical, who was responsible for developing the Wilson Learning Styles Assessment and contributed to the Covey Leadership Assessment. Our 360-degree assessments indicate, among other things, that leaders who bump their Just Ask Number up 10% can expect a 20% improvement in alignment, engagement, and accountability with their teams. How do we know? From surveying these leaders’ coworkers.
One of my high school teachers often said, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. You can give a student a textbook, but you can make him think.” I like Tom Steitz’s version better. Tom brought the U.S. Nordic Combined team from dead last to gold over the course of his twelve years as Olympic coach. He says, “Maybe you can’t lead a horse to water and make him drink, but you sure can tie him to a post in the desert for a few days and feed him salt and then see what he thinks about drinking water.” His point: If people don’t want to change, they haven’t been given sufficient motivation.
The people most resistant to Just Asking are the ones who feel they have all the answers. They could stand to be reminded of the times they were wrong. I once fired a guy who I thought was going nowhere. He went on to become a frontiersman in the snowboarding industry. He retired in his late thirties and lives happily in the mountains.
All leaders are wrong on occasion, so what’s the harm in asking?
As a leader, bear in mind that your answer, even if it’s the best objective answer, might not work well for one of your team members. And don’t underestimate how much ownership of an idea can motivate your team members. Give them a chance to own their ideas. Ask!
The longer a team has been together, the harder it usually is for them to change and innovate. They know each other so well that they can anticipate what their coworkers are going to say on any given subject. It becomes hard to stray from their roles and known positions.
Questions can help spark innovation and create unity simultaneously. Try asking a proponent of a plan to become devil’s advocate and a naysayer to come to the plan’s defense (to become an “angel’s advocate”). Traveling to another perspective tends to reveal common ground and build trust and understanding. It will allow your coworkers, even the “difficult” ones, to expand their roles and defy expectations.
Gary B. Cohen is Partner and Co-founder of CO2 Partners, LCC, working as an executive coach and consultant. He is the author of Just Ask Leadership. For more information please visit: www.justaskleadership.com.
